This is a write-up of our first sesson of 'Badge', a cop-drama set in New York and chronicling the exploits of the Organised Crime Division New York in battling the local crime family, the Martines.

Characters

Jeffrey P. Tanner(Tobias): a young and pampered rich boy (Joaquin Phoenix), who seems to coast by on the reputation and the connections of his father (David Hasselhoff). His issue is 'asshole with a controlling father' (player's own words).

Anna Maria Ramonez(Eva): a young and ambitous woman (Jennifer Esposito) with South American ancestry. That's all we know so far.

CJ Cromwell(Frank): a seasoned veteran in his mid-fifties (Samuel L. Jackson) with a corruption problem and a tendency to drink. A lot. All the time.

The characters are very thread-bare, because all three players had trouble getting into the spirit of the game for one reason or another. I think Tobias just flat out does not comprehend the narrativist angle of the game. Eva is still stuck with creating her character the way she does in other games, i.e. by reacting to the other player's characters during the game. She also had a difficult time coming contributing to scenes, and ended up hemming and hawing when she had to request a scene. Frank, I think, has figured out the general idea behind PtA. But since he's very new to the group (having just moved here recently) he's holding back for now, for fear of messing up the group dynamic. Which is not really necessary, as we've only played together once or twice before.

Pilot:
It was all rather confusing and slow-moving. I don't think I remember all of what happened, but I'll try to run through
the scenes that stood out in one way or another. I think Screen Presence was 1, 2, 1 for Tobias, Eva and Frank respectively.

After a desastrous attempt to find evidence linking Mr. Martine (aka The Frenchman) (Christian Bale) to a drug cartel, Ramonez initiates the creation of a special organized crime division that's focussed on Martine. She is joined by Cromwell, who has been bought by one of the Frenchman's lackeys (Kevin Spacey) and later Tanner after his father has pulled a few strings. Ramonez complete disregard of the various team-members personal status and background quickly results in the team actively disliking her.(The scene that was supposed to highlight her ruthless ambition doesn't hold up well... but led to one of the better scenes in the game so it stayed in.)
Later Tanner somehow gets one of the Frenchman's lawyers (Meat Loaf) to testify in court. This first stroke against Martine leads him to put more pressure, i.e. threaten, Cromwell and his family if Ramonez' team should ever manage to seriously interfere with Martine's operations again. That's about it, I think. Now onto some of the scenes and how they did or did not work.

The first scene, introducing Tanner and his father started out rather well, with everybody giving suggestions how to frame the shot and how it should look like, etc. The scene itself though played out rather oddly. The scene started with Tanner's father giving Tanner a dressing down as he's getting ready for some important meetings. I tried to play him as controlling and disrespectful as possible, hoping to get Tobias to push his character's issue in the scene. His father would put one restriction after another on him (daily reports, weekly meetings, etc.) to which Tanner replied by rolling his eyes and leaving the house. No roll, no apparent conflict. Nothing really.

Looking back, I wonder if I shouldn't have pushed for such an obvious conflict through his father and let Tobias try and find the conflict in the scene himself. Giving him a more active part in the scene, instead of pushing him into a reactive stance.

One of the scenes that worked (IMO) was a scene in which Ramonez had to address the members of the division. In an earlier scene she had requested various specialists to be transferred to her division. Most of those members were rather frustrated about being transferred and were therefore passive-aggressively sabotaging her attempt to get the division to work properly. The conflict in this scene was Ramonez trying to improve morale and getting the team to accept her as team leader. She failed the roll, and thus the team chose Cromwell as the authority in the division and shunned Ramonez.

In a later scene we ended up having a prolonged argument about scene construction. The scene started like this: Tanner was about to interrogate a lawyer working for the syndicate. During the scene Tobias established through dialogue that he was in possession of evidence that would incriminate the lawyer and offer him a deal.

This I really didn't like. There was something very boring and lame about simply establishing something off-screen in order to get what you want in the scene. So I blocked it. The lawyer denied any involvement and refused to talk. We interrupted the game and tried to find out the source of our disagreement. Eventually we settled on Tanner trying to bluff and rolled for that conflict.

Again, now that I look back on it I feel I should have handled this differently, but I'm not sure how. Was it wrong of me to simply block Tobias in-game contribution, because I thought it was boring and did not generate a conflict, IMO? Or should I have just annouced a conflict the moment his and my ideas about where the scene should go clashed, and rolled the dice?

We're still trying to get a handle on the game. What's especially frustrating is that I feel like I 'get' the game when I read it, or follow the debates here... but as soon as I try to run it, I run into problems. After the game we talked about our difficulties a bit, and Tobias asked if scene framing could from now on include a few suggestions about possible conflicts in the scene. The group is struggling with the distinction between Agenda and Conflict of a scene.

Any suggestions? Criticism? Insights?

We're running the next session this monday, and I want to address some of the difficulties we have and hopefully have a
smoother gaming experience this time around.

Screen Presence 1, 2, 1?  That's... sorta low, isn't it?  Was that deliberate?

TonyLB wrote:
Screen Presence 1, 2, 1?  That's... sorta low, isn't it?  Was that deliberate?

Jeffrey P. Tanner(Tobias): a young and pampered rich boy (Joaquin Phoenix), who seems to coast by on the reputation and the connections of his father (David Hasselhoff). His issue is 'asshole with a controlling father' (player's own words).

Anna Maria Ramonez(Eva): a young and ambitous woman (Jennifer Esposito) with South American ancestry. That's all we know so far.

CJ Cromwell(Frank): a seasoned veteran in his mid-fifties (Samuel L. Jackson) with a corruption problem and a tendency to drink. A lot. All the time.

The first scene, introducing Tanner and his father started out rather well, with everybody giving suggestions how to frame the shot and how it should look like, etc. The scene itself though played out rather oddly. The scene started with Tanner's father giving Tanner a dressing down as he's getting ready for some important meetings. I tried to play him as controlling and disrespectful as possible, hoping to get Tobias to push his character's issue in the scene. His father would put one restriction after another on him (daily reports, weekly meetings, etc.) to which Tanner replied by rolling his eyes and leaving the house. No roll, no apparent conflict. Nothing really.

The conflict in this scene was Ramonez trying to improve morale and getting the team to accept her as team leader. She failed the roll, and thus the team chose Cromwell as the authority in the division and shunned Ramonez.

In a later scene we ended up having a prolonged argument about scene construction. The scene started like this: Tanner was about to interrogate a lawyer working for the syndicate. During the scene Tobias established through dialogue that he was in possession of evidence that would incriminate the lawyer and offer him a deal.

This I really didn't like. There was something very boring and lame about simply establishing something off-screen in order to get what you want in the scene. So I blocked it. The lawyer denied any involvement and refused to talk. We interrupted the game and tried to find out the source of our disagreement. Eventually we settled on Tanner trying to bluff and rolled for that conflict.

Matt's got a good point. I think the kind of cop show you're emulating isn't about catching the criminal, but about how the things you have to do to live in that world wear you down. I see a lot of that on NYPD Blue and The Shield. You get the guy, but you make compromises to do it -- let genuinely bad people off in exchange for evidence, collude with criminals, stay on stake-out all week and ignore your wife, etc. You sell your soul a little at a time, and you hope it's worth it.

I tend to let the players take all the rope they want to hang the characters with. Sometimes the best way to do that is to "give" in a scene, let them narrate solving the problem without having a conflict. Then I just shift the conflict to the ramifications of what they've just fiated.

I'd ask the player whether he narrated in that he had the evidence because he wanted to bypass the conflict, or because he wanted one of those "Now, I've got you now, you bastard" situations. If it's the former, and they have in their head that the rules are there to help everybody figure out whether they eventually catch the bad guy, then they might be focused on "mission-based" play, which PTA doesn't do well. If it's the latter, then I don't think there's a problem -- he sets up a scene where he's an arrogant SOB who gets results, damn the cost, you go with that.

This might just be me, coming from playing a lot of Sorcerer, though. I tend to let players solve their initial few problems easily, and use the ramifications of how they do it as fodder for future conflicts.

The characters are very thread-bare, because all three players had trouble getting into the spirit of the game for one reason or another. I think Tobias just flat out does not comprehend the narrativist angle of the game. Eva is still stuck with creating her character the way she does in other games, i.e. by reacting to the other player's characters during the game. She also had a difficult time coming contributing to scenes, and ended up hemming and hawing when she had to request a scene. Frank, I think, has figured out the general idea behind PtA.

Thanks for the replies everybody. Today's game has been cancelled unfortunately as one of the players got sick, but I'm meeting up with the other two for some boardgaming and I'll bring up some of the things posted here.

I do think that both Eva and Tobias are very much used to reactive gaming and I can't tell if they are interested or willing to try a different approach.

I'll try and post an update as soon as we've finished another episode.

After a game of Doom and Roborally yesterday, we ended up talking about our PtA game and RPGs in general. During our conversation I realized that there were a few things I was unclear about as far as running PtA was concerned which I think was the reason why I had so much difficulty with both running and explaining the game.

Tobias complained that once the dice had been rolled, the 'role playing' aspect of a scene ended and took away from his input on the game. He wanted to continue the scene by acting out the consequences of the dice roll. It occured to me that what he wanted to do was add to the game (SiS? I'm hesitant to use any of the Forge-terms as I'm never completely sure I'm using them right) in-character. Unlike other games where you could add or contribute to the game whenever the GM isn't narrating, PtA has a clearly marked window during which the players contribute to the game via in-character action. (Everything outside this window only permits OOC input.)

Said window being the moment the Producer has framed the scene until the moment somebody calls for a conflict roll. During this time the group is focussed on the 'role playing' aspect of the game.

Every other RPG I've played in had a lot of downtime during which players acted aimlessly in-character. In my gaming circles many consider this 'quality role-playing' or even 'in-depth immersion'. The Earthdawn game I played on Sunday consisted of nothing but this aimless role playing, four or five plot events we had no influence over, two fights and an attempt by us to set a trap for some demon. The game lasted 5 hours.

I think one of the biggest differences between PtA and RPGs like Earthdawn is that the rules do not allow for much downtime. They are actually quite unforgiving about it. Once you (as a player) have requested a scene, everyone's attention turns to your character. You get a few minutes to build an interesting scene, and you better make it count. This can be very intimidating in a game where the players are often hesitant to give suggestions (as was the case in my PtA game). You also lack the comfort of lazily throwing random things into the game, whenever you happen to think of them and seeing what sticks. I think this plays into the reason why experienced gamers seem to have trouble getting (into) the game.

PtA has a fundamentally different 'rhythm' (for lack of a better word) to it than other games. I wasn't aware of that and I think that was one of the reasons why the games were so difficult to run for me. The responsibilities of a Producer have similiarities to those of a GM, but they are not the same; especially when it comes to pacing the game. As a GM I try to give the players as much room as he wants to do his thing and adopt a hands-off attitude. But as a Producer I should try to help the player along to get to the conflict/purpose of the scene. Which is something I was hesitant to do, as I didn't want to give players the impression I was railroading them into something I had planned.

Hiya,

I think you're absolutely right about most everything ...

... except I'm kind of puzzled about this part:

Tobias complained that once the dice had been rolled, the 'role playing' aspect of a scene ended and took away from his input on the game. He wanted to continue the scene by acting out the consequences of the dice roll. It occured to me that what he wanted to do was add to the game (SiS? I'm hesitant to use any of the Forge-terms as I'm never completely sure I'm using them right) in-character. Unlike other games where you could add or contribute to the game whenever the GM isn't narrating, PtA has a clearly marked window during which the players contribute to the game via in-character action. (Everything outside this window only permits OOC input.)

Ron wrote:
It seems to me perfectly viable in the PTA rules to narrate conflict outcomes through any blend of in-character or out-of-character dialogue that you want. It's also worth remembering that "narrator" is not the solo monologist that many people might think - he or she is, instead, "maestro of the moment" and can accept narration help or suggestions from anyone ... and some of that input could easily be in terms of in-character dialogue.

Sadly, the game's been cancelled as one of the players has jumped ship.

Thanks for the replies, I'll apply the new ideas and insights I've taken from this thread to the next game of PtA I'll run... someday.

Which one, and what reasons did they give?

Some quick suggestions on how to identify the right moment to roll a conflict in PTA:

Joe wrote:
His father would put one restriction after another on him (daily reports, weekly meetings, etc.) to which Tanner replied by rolling his eyes and leaving the house. No roll, no apparent conflict. Nothing really.

Joe wrote:
This I really didn't like. There was something very boring and lame about simply establishing something off-screen in order to get what you want in the scene. So I blocked it. The lawyer denied any involvement and refused to talk.

Alan wrote:
Trying to leave a scene is a call to resolve a conflict.  That is the moment to roll.  Does Tanner keep his cool and just leave, or does he blow up at dad? 

The moment the players (including the producer) disagree about what happens next -- that's when to roll a conflict.  Let the dice decide.  The point of the conflict is whether the lawyer talks.  Whetehr the evidence against him is geniune doesn't matter to the roll -- though if you win narration, you could describe the "evidence" as bogus, provided you still describe the success or failure of the interrogation.

Joe wrote:
Should I suggest it out-of-game ("Hey, maybe we could make this scene be about whether Tanner loses his cool?")